& Other Things

I managed to forget something important in my last post, despite the fact that it's closely related to one of the things I did mention; that is, Echoes of War is out. At least, it got shipped to me last week; few others seem to have gotten it already, and as far as I know it hasn't even hit peer-to-peer networks yet.

Echoes of War is an orchestral remix/arrangement of music from all three of Blizzard's universes - Warcraft (III, World of Warcraft), Starcraft (I & II), and Diablo (I-III) - by Eminence. It's about one and a half hours of music, with several tracks from each game and each track being a medley of game pieces.

While some of them fairly closely follow the original sound, some of them are arranged in very novel and surprising ways. Two of the best examples of this are the big band jazz arrangement of the Starcraft I Terran music, and the crazy symphonic/operatic/Middle Eastern/The Rock arrangement of the Starcraft I Zerg music. (other samples can be played from the Echoes of War media section)

How much I like the tracks varies by the track. Several of them I really like, although I'm noticably less fond of the Diablo tracks than the Warcraft and Starcraft ones. But in any case, the album is awesome. If you like the music of Warcraft, Starcraft, and/or Diablo, buy it. I just wish the stupid thing was sold by stores that didn't charge you $14 for shipping...